Fieldwork and Language Documentation

Here's the latest from the California Language Archive(link is external):

In the last couple of years, Bernat Bardagil(link is external) (postdoc 2018-2020) has facilitated the acquisition of three legacy collections of materials related to Mỹky (isolate; Brazil). One of these collections has been accessioned(link is external). The two others, from the family of American missionary Robert Meader (1912-1997) and German anthropologist Gisela Pauli, are currently being cataloged. Digital copies of photographs and -- thanks to the quick work of Digital Revolution(link is external) -- sound recordings are already making their way home. In the photographs below, Mỹky-speaking elders peruse some of Meader's photographs, dating from 1936 forward (top, February 2024), and listen to Pauli's recordings of the late Tapurá, from 1996 (bottom, February 2025).

Here's the latest from the California Language Archive(link is external):

Did you miss our end-of-year newsletter? Read it here(link is external)! We have made available digital copies of 11 cassette tape recordings made by musicologist Susana Weich-Shahak(link is external) in Peru in 1974 and 1975, consisting of stories, songs, and conversations in Arakmbut (Harakmbut), Ashaninka (Arawakan), Máíjĩ̵̀kì (Tukanoan), and Yagua (Peba-Yaguan), from the communities of Shintuya, Cutivireni, Sucusari, and Catalán, respectively (listen to an excerpt of Luis Ríos's (Bábì) story of Maineno in Máíjĩ̵̀kì here(link is external)). The larger collection, the Colección de Materiales de Lenguas Peruanas de Susana Weich-Shahak(link is external), was previously accessioned, and additionally includes 8mm film and photographic slides, all of which are also now digitized. Zachary Wellstood(link is external), together with Nellie and R. David Zorc, has accessioned Documenting Aklanon Morphosyntax(link is external). The collection consists of materials spanning a field methods course at the University of Maryland in 2018 and 2019, with Maria Polinsky and Omer Preminger (recordings and notes in bundles 001-021), and telephone-based research afterward. The documentation focuses on grammatical topics.

Congrats to the Berkeley linguists who will be presenting their work at the Annual Meeting of the Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas(link is external), taking place online from January 24 to 26:

Anna Björklund(link is external): "The structure of the Nomlaki verb" Maksymilian Dąbkowski(link is external): "Teasing the A'ingae discourse and conditional marking apart"